CLASH IN PRINCE’S PARK Austrian Nazis Attack Jews— Liechtenstein Ruler Vexed Wireless to THE NEW YORK TIMES. VIENNA, July 16.—The Jews, who ‘have been banned from all public gardens in Vienna, have been fre- quenting many large private gardens owned by the aristocracy and opened to the general public. Recently considerable. numbers visited the park owned by the ruling Prince Franz Joseph of Liechten- stein. National Socialists attempted to force them out of there as well and violent scenes ensued. The Prince has now temporarily closed his gardens and has regis- tered a protest with the party head- quarters on this violation of his pro- prietory rights. The New York Times Published: July 17, 1938 ------- FRANZ I, EX-RULER OF LIECHTENSTEIN Prince Who Delegated Power of Government to Nephew in March Is Dead at 85 ONCE AN AUSTRIAN ENVOY Retired After Anschluss and Had Since Defied Nazis— Reigned Nine Years Wireless to THE NEW YORK TIMES, PRAGUE, July 26.—Prince Franz I of Liechtenstein, ruler of the tiny, principality between Switzerland and Austria, died last night in his Czechoslovak castle at Feldsberg at the age of 85. His grandnephew, the Regent Franz Joseph, succeeds to the title. Only a few weeks ago Prince Franz foiled an Austrian Nazi ef- fort to prevent Jews from visiting his large gardens which surround his famous picture gallery in Vien- na. An ordinance had been issued to ban all Jews from public parks. The Prince warned that if the ordi- nance applied to his estate, he would close the gallery to the pub- lic altogether. Since the Nazis came into power in Germany, and particularly since Austrian Anschluss, much propa- ganda has been carried on in Liechtenstein for union with the Reich. It became so strong that a few months ago the aged Prince handed over the reins of govern- ment to his nephew, but remained the ruler pro forma. The young Prince is reputed to have Nazi leanings. This was denied today to Tur NEW YORK TIMEs, but it is admitted there is a well defined movement for union with Germany. Succeeded ‘Phantom Prince” One of the wealthiest European nobles, one-time ruler over the quaint and tiny principality of Liechtenstein, Prince Maria Karl August Franz von Paula ascended the throne of his country upon the death in 1929 of his brother, Johann II, the ‘‘phantom Prince," who had reigned for seventy-one vears. Nine years later, on March 30, 1938, the elderly Prince handed over the governmental reins to his heir, Prince Franz Joseph. It was significant in the life of this unique ruler that the Almanach de Gotha gave as his residence, in addition to Vaduz, the capital of Liechtenstein, his estate, Felds- berg, in Czechoslovakia, and the address of Bankgasse 9, in Vienna. For the Prince preferred to live outside his country, which, with a population of about 11,500, is five square miles smaller than the District of Columbia. With the annexation of Austria by Germany the 84-year-old sovereign decided to abdicate because ‘‘he considered himself too old to carry on his task," as the official an- nouncement declared. Another reason for his abdication wag probably the fact that Prince Franz had married Elsa von Eroes, the former Baroness Guttmann, a Jewess, publicly on July 22, 1929. German Nazis attacked the mar- riage even at that time. The Prince’s marriage had been secret for years and even the sec- ond ceremony took place in the ancient village church at Lainz, a Vienna suburb, at midnight. The Baroness, first married to a Hun- garian nobleman, had been a widow for five years and was 54. She came from a family of Jewish bankers, said to have controlled property worth $100,000,000. Their interests in the arts were mutual, each possessing art collec- tions recognized as among the fin- est in Europe. Their romance be- gan shortly after the war, but both kept it a secret, the Prince con- scious of the fact that his Roman Catholie family would disapprove. Consequently, he married the Baroness secretly in Salzburg in 1921. Traced Ancestry to 12th Century The Prince, descended from the reigning family of Liechtenstein, which traced its ancestry to the twelfth century and came from free barons who became princes of the country in 1608. He was born to the title of Duke of Troppau and Jaegerndorf on Aug. 28, 1853, at Castle Liechtenstein, son of Prince Aloys and the former Countess Franziska Kinsky von Wchinitz and Tettau. Most of his early life was spent in Vienna, where the Prince played an important role in the court life of the double monarchy. He en- tered the Austrian diplomatic serv- ice and served as Austro-Hungarian Ambassador to Russia from 1894 to 1898. He declined the portfolio of Foreign Minister and, while resign- ing from diplomatic service, re- mained in the inner circle of the Emperor Franz Joseph, whose con- fidence he enjoyed. Although holding aloof from poli- tics after the World War, Prince Franz undertook a political’ mission in 1925, when it was learned that he had served as an emissary of the former Bavarian Crown Prince Rupprecht. He went to Hungary to confer with the Hungarian legit- imist leader and Archduke Albrecht, and was supposed to have begged the latter to declare his uncondi- tional allegiance to Archduke Otto. Occasionally the ruler met a dele- gation of his Socialist or Repub- lican subjects, who would urge his abdication for the sake of a peo- ple’s State. Whenever it happened, the Prince won the argument. He merely mentioned that he was ready to go—and would at the same time stop his $110,000 contribution to the treasury. The magnitude of the Prince’s possessions was shown in one of the greatest land transactions ever put through in Europe. In August, 1830, a ‘voluntary agreement’ was signed between the Czechoslovak Land Reform Office and the chan- cellery of the Prince, according to which the latter surrendered against a limited payment 172,900 acres of land to the State for redis- tribution. The Prince surrendered another 88,000 acres, leaving him still 128,500 acres of valuable land in the Czechoslovak Republic. The value of the surrendered estates were estimated at the time at near- ly $50,000,000. Liechtenstein, during the turmoil of the post-war period, had more and more become a paradise for wealthy taxpayers and industrial concerns transacting business in Europe. They established head- quarters at Vaduz, thus enjoying tax exemption. The Prince wel- comed them but barred gambling, continuing the decree issued by his predecessor. He had no army and but a handful of policemen. The New York Times Published: July 27, 1938 |
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